Those Places Thursday (January 16, 2014) -- National Jamborees, Boy Scouts of America

In 1969 I was a Boy Scout and that summer I attended the Boy Scouts of America National Jamboree held at Farragut State Park outside Coeur d'Alene, Idaho.  National Jamborees are held by the BSA about once every four years.  The 1969 Jamboree was the first of five National Jamborees that I have attended.  The other four I attended as an adult and I served in various capacities including as a Jamboree Troop 1st Assistant Scoutmaster, as a Jamboree Troop Scoutmaster, as a member of the Northeast Regional Staff (Action Alley), and, during the 100th BSA Anniversary Jamboree in 2010, as a member of the Jamboree Security Staff.  Both of our sons are Eagle Scouts.  One attended the 1997 Jamboree as a youth participant and the other attended the 2001 Jamboree as a youth participant.  National Jamborees are part of our family history.

The 1969 National Jamboree was actually held five years after the previous Jamboree held at Valley Forge, Pennsylvania in 1964.  The 1969 National Jamboree was delayed for a year because in 1967 the Boy Scouts of America hosted the World Jamboree for the first time and the World Jamboree was held at Farragut State Park. 

The Boy Scouts of America have held eighteen* National Jamborees as of the one held the summer of 2013.  The first Jamboree was to have been held in Washington, DC in August 1935, but it had to be canceled due to a polio epidemic. The first BSA National Jamboree to actually take place was held on the Mall in Washington, DC in 1937 with 27,238 youth and adult participants from around the country. 

A Jamboree usually lasts for seven days as it did in 1953, 1957, 1960, 1964, 1969, 1973, 1977, 1981, 1985, 1989, 1993; but in 1937, 1950, 1997, 2001, 2005, 2010 and 2013 the Jamborees were ten days long.  Over the years, National Jamborees have been held in eight different locations in the country: Washington, DC (1937); Valley Forge, PA (1950, 1957 and 1964); Irvine Ranch, CA ( 1953); Colorado Springs, CO (1960); Farragut State Park, ID (1969 and 1973*); Moraine State Park, PA (1973* and 1977); Fort A.P. Hill, VA (1981, 1985, 1989, 1993, 1997, 2001, 2005, and 2010); and, most recently, at the new BSA-owned "Bechtel Family National Scout Reserve - The Summit" in WV. Now that the BSA owns and controls 10,600 acres in West Virginia, The Summit will become the permanent home for all future National Jamborees. 

National Jamborees have always attracted tens of thousands of participants (youth and adult) from around the U.S. and some foreign countries.  The smallest of the National Jamborees was in 1937 at 27, 238 participants, but the Jamborees in 1977 and 1981 were not much larger at 28,601, and 29,765 participants respectively.  Setting aside the unique East/West Jamborees of 1973, which had a combined total of 73,610 participants, the largest single Jamboree is still the one held at Colorado Springs in 1960 with 56,377 participants.  The largest National Jamboree in the last 48 years has been the 2010 Jamboree, which was held in the year of the 100th Anniversary of the founding of the Boy Scouts of America and had 43,434 participants.  That made the 100th Anniversary Jamboree the sixth largest Jamboree after 1960 (56,377), 1957 (52,580), 1964 (50,960), 1950 (47,163), and 1953 (45,401). 

As a youth participant at the 1969 National Jamboree, I was a member of a temporary "expeditionary Troop" formed from registered Scouts in Burlington County, NJ where my family lived at the time. Our Jamboree Troop #26 (pictured at the top of this post) was comprised of four "patrols" and I was the Patrol Leader for one of them -- the "Unami" patrol. Our patrol totem is hanging second from the left on the Troop's gateway in the photo above.

The shape of our patrol totem is a turtle because the area that became Burlington County, New Jersey was a small part of the ancestral home of the Lenape (lun-NAH-pay) people who were later called the  "Delaware" by the English. The Lenape were separated into three main sub-tribes: the Minsi symbolized by the Wolf; the Unami symbolized by the Turtle; and the Unalachtigo symbolized by the Turkey. The founder of the Province of Pennsylvania, William Penn, made his 1682 peace and land purchase treaty ("Penn's Treaty") with the Unami and the Unalachtigo peoples. Since the Unami lived in the areas bordering both sides of the Delaware River where the Philadelphia environs and Burlington County are now located, we decided to name our patrol the Unami.

The participant patch for the BSA's 1969 National Jamboree

The participant patches for (left to right top to bottom) the BSA's 2010, 2005, 2001 and 1997 National Jamborees

Oh, in the event you are trying to find me in the Troop 26 photograph above, I am the one kneeling at the far right in the second row. So young, such hair . . .

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* Purists will sometimes argue that there have actually only been seventeen truly "National" Jamborees because in 1973 the Jamboree was actually split between two locations -- one in the east (Moraine State Park, PA) and one in the west (Farragut State Park, ID) -- AND they were not even held simultaneously because the western location started on August 1, 1973 and the eastern location started two days later on August 3, 1973.  The 1973 Jamboree is unique, thus far, because all other Jamborees have occurred at a single location.

  

Original photograph in the personal collection of the author.

The image of the 1771-72 Benjamin West painting of William Penn's treaty with the Indians is from the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts in Philadelphia.  The work is in the public domain because it was published or registered before January 1, 1923. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Treaty_of_Penn_with_Indians_by_Benjamin_West.jpg 

Images of the Jamboree participant "patches" for the 1969, 2010, 2005, 2001 and 1997 National Jamborees made from original patches in the personal collection of the author.

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Copyright 2014, John D. Tew

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One Hundred Years Ago Today . . . and my small connection to it.

Jesse Owens at the 1936 Olympics in Berlin, Germany

Before there was Mark Spitz or Michael Phelps, there was Jesse Owens, the enormously talented American runner.  Mr. Owens ran to immortality by taking four gold medals at the 1936 Olympics in Berlin, Germany.  He won in the 100 meter and 200 meter sprints as well as in the long jump.  He also won gold as one of the runners in the 4 x 100 meter relay.  To give just a small idea of how dominant a runner he was, he tied the world record in the 100-yard sprint in 1933 as a high school student!

But Jesse Owens also earned a place in history in 1936 by proving that individual performance and not race or national origin is what counts in sports -- and by extension in everyday life when not hampered by virulent discrimination and blind hatred.  Much to the chagrin of Adolph Hitler and his devotees, as shown below Mr. Owens rose to the summit of the victory stand four times -- including for the two premier running events.  He did so in stark, undeniable disproof of the Nazi racial superiority claims AND he did so for all the world to see!

Today is the 100th anniversary of the birth of James Cleveland "Jesse" Owens.  He was born September 12, 1913 in Oakville, Alabama.  He was the youngest of ten children and when he was nine years old his family moved north to Cleveland, Ohio as part of the Great Migration of 1.5 million African Americans out of the segregated South.  At the time, he was known in his family as "J.C." for the initials of his first and middle names, and so when asked by his teacher in Ohio to state his name for entry into the attendance book he said "J.C. Owens" and she mistakenly wrote down "Jesse Owens" due to her misunderstanding of his heavy southern pronunciation. Owens later attended Ohio State University and became known as the "Buckeye Bullet."  Shockingly for a runner, Mr. Owens became a pack-a-day smoker after his running career and died in Tucson, Arizona on March 31, 1980 from lung cancer.  He is buried in Oak Woods Cemetery in Chicago.

In 1969, I was in the Boy Scouts and attended the 1969 Boy Scouts of America National Jamboree held at Farragut State Park outside Coeur d'Alene, Idaho.  I was a member of a temporary  expeditionary Troop formed from registered Scouts in Burlington County, NJ.  I was also what was called a "hometown correspondent" and sent periodic reports to the local newspaper about our trip by bus across the country to the National Jamboree -- so I had a "press pass" at the Jamboree and had access to VIP visitor events at the Jamboree.  Among the VIP visitors was Lady Baden-Powell, wife of the late founder of Scouting, and Jesse Owens.  As a cross country and track runner in high school I was almost beside myself with the opportunity to meet and shake hands with Mr. Owens.  Not only did I shake hands with him, I got his autograph on a page in my notebook!  [I think the other signature is from a Scouting VIP whose name I forget and whose last name I cannot make out.  I have wished many times that I had the foresight to make sure Jesse Owens's autograph was on its own page without any other signatures.]

Autograph of Jesse Owens obtained at the
1969 Boy Scouts of America National Jamboree

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Photograph of Jesse Owens running is in the public domain because its copyright has expired and its author/creator is anonymous.  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Jesse_Owens3.jpg

Photograph of Jesse Owens on the victory stand used under the Creative Common Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Germany license.  The photo is attributed to Bundesarchiv, Bild 183-G00630/CC-BY-SA. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Bundesarchiv_Bild_183-G00630,_Sommerolympiade,_Siegerehrung_Weitsprung.jpg

Scanned image of the original autograph of Jesse Owens in the collection of the author.

For more detailed information about Jesse Owens and his life, go to the Wikipedia entry here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jesse_Owens 

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Copyright 2013, John D. Tew

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Saturday Serendipity (July 20, 2013)

Saturdays often allow a more leisurely approach to life than work days. I can more easily post links to some blog posts or other materials I have discovered during the week, or even to those discovered during a Saturday morning coffee and extended surfing of the blogosphere/internet.

Here are a few serendipitous discoveries from this week that I commend for inclusion on your reading list.

1.  It bears repeating that anyone with a genealogy that involves Rhode Island -- or who has just a general interest in the history of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations -- must add Diane Boumenot's One Rhode Island Family to their blog follow list!  On July 14th Diane posted an indexed map of Providence from 1881 that she scanned and has made available with zoom and navigation functions here.  Thank you Diane!!       

2.  Judy Russell at The Legal Genealogist has performed a great service for all of us that have an interest in genetic genealogy, but are challenged by the pace of the developing science of DNA testing.  Judy has assembled a list of what she calls "the must-read blogs of genetic genealogy."  She provides brief summaries and links to six bloggers and their blogs.  I am working my way through each of them and suggest you check them out too.  Thank you Judy! 

3.  Most of the recommendations in Saturday Serendipity are for interesting or instructive reads. This recommendation is a YouTube video of 11minutes 57 seconds called "BOATLIFT."  If you have not yet seen BOATLIFT, narrated by actor Tom Hanks, you need to take 12 minutes to watch it here.  You will learn about the largest, fastest evacuation by sea in history -- and even though Dunkirk evacuated some 339,000 people over nine days, it pales in comparison to the evacuation you will see and learn about!  This one took about nine hours and evacuated about 500,000 people!  [Thanks to Ron, the Director of the office where I work, for the link to this amazing video!]   

4.  Yesterday there was a convergence of historical events that should not go by without notice and comment, so here are two links that are worth reading.  TEASER:  It took 72 years from the first event for the call to be accomplished . . . and then it took another 64 years for the second event  -- a related major milestone in American history to be accomplished.  [Perhaps 32 years after the second event and 168 years after the first event another historic accomplishment could take place in 2016.  It's possible!]         

5.   Randy Seaver at Genea-Musings had a summary of viewpoints from his readers on several topics including online family trees, what is direct and indirect evidence, and is citing to indexes a sign of a bad researcher.  The comments are instructive and you can read them here. AND, you definitely have to check out the link to the National Atlas website showcased by Randy yesterday.  See his "Rivers of America" post here!

6.  And finally, today is one of those singular dates in human history that should never be forgotten -- though I worry that those who were not at least of school age at the time have no real connection to the event and thus it is merely a passing historical marker (like the ones on the side of the road pointing to some long-ago battlefield) because they did not share in the global watch that took place on July 20, 1969.  I am speaking of course about the 44th anniversary of the day mankind first landed on an extraterrestrial body -- the day Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin landed on the surface of the Moon at a location known as the "Sea of Tranquility." They were the first of twenty-four American astronauts who have traveled to the Moon.  I suggest you spend a few minutes today or tomorrow reading about this monumental event and achievement.  You can read about it here  -- especially if you do not personally recall the event.

Tomorrow, July 21st at 02:56 UTC [Coordinated Universal Time which is the same as Greenwich Mean Time except that GMT is not precisely defined by the scientific community any longer] marks the moment six hours after the landing when a human being first stepped foot on a body in the cosmos other than Earth.  It was not quite ten years from the moment the first man-made object reached the surface of the Moon on September 13, 1959 until the first humans walked on its surface on July 21, 1969.  Read about the history of Moon explorations and landings here.   

I have very vivid memories of the Moon landing because I was one of the 35,000 participants at the Boy Scout 1969 National Jamboree at Farragut State Park outside Coeur d'Alene, Idaho when the landing took place.  Neil Armstrong was an Eagle Scout and so when the famous words came, "Houston, Tranquility Base here.  The Eagle has landed," it had additional meaning at the Jamboree.  [The lunar module that Armstrong and Aldrin rode to the Moon's surface was named the Eagle.  If you read the first Moon landing link above, you will find an interesting factoid about how this name came to be.] The Moon landing was a highlight of the Jamboree for me and 34,999 others in many ways, but I also had the opportunity to personally meet both Jesse Owens and Lady Olave Baden-Powell (wife of Scouting founder Lord Baden-Powell).

My 1969 National Jamboree participant's patch

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A scan of my original 1969 National Jamboree patch, which I hand sewed into clear plastic with snaps on the back so it could be snapped onto my uniform, but would remain in pristine condition.  The "Building To Serve" rocker displayed the theme of the Jamboree and had to be earned by performing 15 different tasks (one for each letter in the theme) that got signed off/stamped on a card with the 15 letters of the theme.   

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Copyright 2013, John D. Tew

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